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Alumni & Collaborators

VSSL is passionate not just about driving change in our focus areas, but training others to do the same. We have been fortunate to mentor and work with individuals who have gone on to different roles within health care. We are also honored to collaborate with other individuals at UW. Read on to learn more about each individual (list alphabetically).

Anders Chen, MD, MHS 

Dr. Chen is an Assistant Professor in the UW School of Medicine. He completed medical school at the University of California, San Francisco, residency training at UW, and a Masters at Johns Hopkins University. His collaborations with VSSL include the following:​

  • Liao JM, Chen A, Navathe AS. The Real Opportunities of MIPS Payment Adjustments. Health Affairs Forefront. 2018. (link)

  • Navathe AS, Dinh CT, Chen A, Liao JM. Findings and Implications from MIPS Year 1 Performance Data. Health Affairs Forefront. 2019. (link)

  • Liao JM, Chen A, Dinh CT, Navathe AS. Supporting Small Practices in MIPS. Health Affairs Forefront. 2019. (link)

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Ryan Clodfelter, MD

Dr. Clodfelter earned his MD from Brown Medical School. He completed the PCDI Immersive during his training as an internal medicine resident at the University of Washington. Under the mentorship of Dr. Liao, his work during the immersive focused on payment innovation, a focus that led to the following deliverables:​

  • Staloff J, Liao JM, Clodfelter R, Marcotte LM. Direct Contracting. VSSL Briefs. 2020; 1:5. (link)

  • Liao JM, Clodfelter RP, Huang JJ, Zhou L, Bhatt J, Kupferman G, Kralovec PD, Navathe AS. Organizational Capacity of Hospitals Co-Participating in Accountable Care Organizations and Bundled Payments. Am J Med Qual. 2022. (link)

  • Clodfelter R, Liao JM, Marcotte LMPathways to Success Medicare Shared Savings Program. VSSL Briefs. 2020. (link)

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Carly Hudelson, MD, MSc

Dr. Hudelson earned her MD from Harvard Medical School and MSc in Evidence Based Social Intervention from Oxford. She previously worked at the Mongan Institute for Health Policy at Massachusetts General Hospital. Dr. Hudelson completed the PCDI Immersive while she was a resident physician in the primary care track at the University of Washington. Her work during the immersive focused on Transitional Care Management services as interventions to improve care coordination and outcomes for patients during the transition after hospital discharge. That work led to the following deliverables:

  • Hudelson C, Marcotte LM. Transitional Care Management. VSSL Briefs. 2019. (link)

  • Marcotte LM, Reddy A, Zhou L, Miller SC, Hudelson C, Liao JM. Trends in Utilization of Transitional Care Management in the United States. JAMA Netw Open. 2020. (link)

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Catherine Hwang, MD, MSPH

Dr. Hwang earned her MD from the University of Washington and MSPH from Johns Hopkins University with a focus in pharmacoepidemiology and drug safety. She was also previously a fellow in the Division of Epidemiology at the US Food and Drug Administration. Dr. Hwang completed a longitudinal fellowship with VSSL while she was a resident physician at Virginia Mason Medical Center. Under the mentorship of Dr. Liao, her work led to the following deliverables:​

  • Hwang CS, Reddy A, Liao JM. Bridging to Value with Codes that Promote Care Management. Am J Manag Care. 2020. (link)

  • Marcotte LM, Chen A, Hwang CS, Liao JM. Primary Care-Oriented Pathways to Support Population-Based Payment Models. J Clin Pathways. 2019. (link)

  • Hwang CS, Liao JM, Reddy A, Carlo AD, Marcotte LM. The Psychiatric Collaborative Care Model in Primary Care. VSSL Briefs. 2020. (link)

  • Hwang CS, White AA, Liao JM. Use HCC Coding to Engage Hospitalists in Value-Based Care. ACP Hospitalist. 2021. (link)

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Leah Marcotte, MD

Dr. Marcotte obtained her MD from the University of Pennsylvania. She trained in internal medicine at UW. She worked in VSSL under the mentorship of Dr. Liao and produced the following deliverables:

  • Marcotte LM, Chen A, Hwang CS, Liao JM. Primary Care-Oriented Pathways to Support Population-Based Payment Models. J Clin Pathways. 2019. (link)

  • Hudelson C, Marcotte LM. Transitional Care Management. VSSL Briefs. 2019. (link)

  • Marcotte LM, Reddy A, Zhou L, Miller SC, Hudelson C, Liao JM. Trends in Utilization of Transitional Care Management in the United States. JAMA Netw Open. 2020. (link)

  • Marcotte LM, Reddy A, Liao JM. Addressing Avoidable Healthcare Costs: Time to Cool Off on Hotspotting in Primary Care? J Gen Intern Med. 2019. (link)

  • Staloff J, Liao JM, Clodfelter R, Marcotte LM. Direct Contracting. VSSL Briefs. 2020; 1:5. (link)

  • Marcotte LM, Schuttner L, Liao JM. Measuring Low-value Care: Learning from the US Experience Measuring Quality. BMJ Quality & Safety. 2020. (link)

  • Marcotte LM, Staloff J, Reddy A, Liao JM, Primary Care Reform Intervention Stakeholder Matrix. 2021. (link)

  • Clodfelter R, Liao JM, Marcotte LMPathways to Success Medicare Shared Savings Program. VSSL Briefs. 2020. (link)

  • Marcotte LM, Krimmel-Morrison J, Liao JM. How to Keep Diffusion of Responsibility From Undermining Value-Based Care. AMA J Ethics. 2020. (link).

  • Reddy A, Marcotte LM, Zhou L, Fihn SD, Liao JM. Use of Chronic Care Management Among Primary Care Clinicians. Ann Fam Med. 2020. (link).

  • Marcotte LM, Liao JM. Incorporating Test Characteristics Into SARS-CoV-2 Testing Policy—Sense and Sensitivity. JAMA Health Forum. 2020. (link)

  • Marcotte LM, Navathe AS, Staloff J, Liao JM. Medicare's Reliance on Acute Hospitalization Rates Could Undercut the Impact of its Primary Care First Program. Health Affairs Forefront. 2020. (link)

  • Morgan KM, Marcotte LM, Zhou L, Liao JM. Annual Wellness Visits in the Era of Value-Based Care: National Trends in Use, 2011-2018. J Gen Intern Med. 2020. (link)

  • Marcotte LM, Liao JM. What We Talk About When We Talk About Care Management. Am J Manag Care. 2020. (link)

  • Staloff J, Marcotte LM, Liao JM. First things first: Analysing predecessor programmes to glean insights about Medicare's primary care first programme. Management in Health Care. 2020. (link)

  • Marcotte LM, Reddy A, Zhou L, Liao JM. Nationwide Use of Telehealth Among Commercially Insured Individuals 2007-2017. J Gen Intern Med. 2021. (link)

  • Marcotte LM, Reddy A, Zhou L, Rzliff A, Unutzer J, Chang D, Liao JM. Provision of Collaborative Care Model and General Behavioral Health Integration Services in Medicare. Psychiatr Serv. 2021. (link)

  • Marcotte LM, Zech JM, Liao JM. Key Features Underlying Low-Value Care Recommendations. Am J Med Qual. 2021. (link)

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Sophie Miller, MD, MPH

Dr. Miller earned her MD from the University of Washington and MPH from the T.H. Chan Harvard School of Public Health. Dr. Miller completed the PCDI Immersive while she was an internal medicine resident at the University of Washington. During her immersive, she focused on evaluating several aspects of Medicare's Merit-based Incentive Payment System payment reform, with particular focus on internists. The work completed during her immersive under the mentorship of Dr. Liao led to the following deliverables:

  • Liao JM, Miller SC, Navathe AS. To Succeed, MIPS Value Pathways Need More Episodic Cost Measures. 2019. Health Affairs Forefront. (link)

  • Marcotte LM, Reddy A, Zhou L, Miller SC, Hudelson C, Liao JM. Trends in Utilization of Transitional Care Management in the United States. JAMA Netw Open. 2020. (link)

  • Miller SC, Liao JM. MIPS Value Pathways: A Salient Development for Internists. Annals Fresh Look. (link)

  • Miller SC, Liao JM. An Opportunity for Internists to Lead in Value-Based Care Through MIPS Value Pathways. Annals of Fresh Look. (link)

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Kate Morgan, MD, MPP

Dr. Morgan earned her MD at Harvard Medical School and her MPP from Harvard Kennedy School. She was a VSSL fellow while she was an internal medicine resident physician at the University of Washington, when she also completed the residency’s Health Systems Pathway and Primary Care Track. She conducted work during her VSSL fellowship experience under the mentorship of Dr. Liao, which led to the following deliverables: 

  • Morgan KM, Marcotte LM, Zhou L, Liao JM. Annual Wellness Visits in the Era of Value-Based Care: National Trends in Use, 2011-2018. J Gen Intern Med. 2020. (link)

  • Perez KM, Liao JM. Medicare Annual Wellness Visit. VSSL Briefs. 2020. (link)

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Ashok Reddy, MD, MS

Dr. Reddy is an internist and Assistant Professor in Department of Medicine at UW. He completed medical school at Emory, internal medicine training at the University of Washington, and a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholars Fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania. He has participate in, collaborated on, or co-led a series of VSSL projects.

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Joshua E. Rosen, MD, MHS

Dr. Rosen earned his MD and MHS from Yale University School of Medicine. He conducted work through VSSL during his general surgery residency training under the mentorship of Dr. Liao, which led to the following deliverables: â€‹

  • Rosen JE, Agrawal N, Flum DR, Liao JM. Willigness to Undergo Antibiotic Treatment of Acute Appendicitis Based on Risk of Treatment Failure. Br J Surg. 2021;108(11):e361-e363. (link). 

  • Rosen JE, Agrawal N, Flum DR, Liao JM. Unrealistic Optimism about Treatment Risks for Acute Appendicitis. Br J Surg. 2022;109(5):405-407. (link). 

  • Rosen JE, Agrawal N, Flum DR, Liao JM. Verbal Descriptions of the Probability of Treatment Complications Lead to High Variability in Risk Perceptions: A Survey Study. Ann Surg. 2021. doi:10.1097/SLA.0000000000005255. (link). 

  • Zhang IY, Wong ES, Rosen JE, Gordon DB, Flum DR, Liao JM. Association between a statewide Medicaid opioid policy and postoperative opioid prescribing among surgeons at a large safety-net hospital. Journal of the American College of Surgeons. In press. 

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Linnaea Schuttner, MD, MS

Dr. Schuttner earned her MD and MS degrees from UW. She trained in internal medicine and pediatrics at UCLA.  She conducted work through VSSL under the mentorship of Dr. Liao during her VA Puget Sound Health Services Research & Development fellowship, which led to the following deliverables: 

  • Schuttner L, Reddy A, White AA, Wong ES, Liao JM. Quality in the Context of Value: Reliability of Quality Metrics in an Academic Health System Shifting Toward Value-Based Payments. Am J Med Qual. 2020. (link)

  • Marcotte LM, Schuttner L, Liao JM. Measuring Low-value Care: Learning from the US Experience Measuring Quality. BMJ Quality & Safety. 2020. (link)

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Andrew White, MD

Dr. White is a hospitalist and Professor in the UW School of Medicine. He completed medical school at Vanderbilt University and internal medicine residency at UW. He works with the VSSL team on population health interventions involving the electronic health record. His collaborations with Dr. Liao led to the following:

  • Schuttner L, Reddy A, White AA, Wong ES, Liao JM. Quality in the Context of Value: Reliability of Quality Metrics in an Academic Health System Shifting Toward Value-Based Payments. Am J Med Qual. 2020. (link)

  • White AA, Liao JM. Policy in Clinical Practice: Hospital Price Transparency. J Hosp Med. 2021;16(11):688-690. (link)

  • Liao JM, Bai G, Forman HP, White AA, Lee CI. JACR Health Policy Expert Panel: Hospital Price Transparency. J Am Coll Radiol. 2022;19(6):792-794. (link)

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Edwin Wong, PhD

Dr. Wong is a Research Associate Professor in the Department of Health Systems and Population Health at UW and a Core Investigator at the Center for Veteran-Centered and Value-Driven Care within the VA Puget Sound Health Care System. He collaborates with the VSSL team on a wide range of projects.

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Irene Zhang, MD

Dr. Zhang earned her MD from Harvard Medical School. She conducted work through VSSL during her general surgery residency training under the mentorship of Dr. Liao, which led to the following deliverables: â€‹

  • Zhang IY, Wong ES, Rosen JE, Gordon DB, Flum DR, Liao JM. Association between a statewide Medicaid opioid policy and postoperative opioid prescribing among surgeons at a large safety-net hospital. Journal of the American College of Surgeons. In press. 

  • Zhang IY, Liao JM. Incorporating emotions into clinical decision-making solutions. Healthcare. 2021. doi: 10.1016/j.hjdsi.2021.100569. (link)

  • Zhang IY, Liao JM. Applying behavioral science insights to medical management strategies: the role of validation testing. Healthcare. 2021. doi: 10.1016/j.hjdsi.2021.100582. (link)

  • Zhang IY, Flum DR, Agrawal N, Liao JM. Perspectives on opioid minimization after surgery and the impact of surgeon messaging. American College of Surgeons Clinical Congress, 2021.

  • Zhang IY, Norwitz D, Drewnowski A, Agrawal N, Flum DR, Liao JM. Applying behavioral nudges in a dietary comparator for surgical trials: developing the MediDiet. 17th Annual Academic Surgical Congress, 2022.

  • Zhang IY, Norwitz D, Drewnowski A, Agrawal N, Flum DR, Liao JM. Applying Behavioral Nudges in a Dietary Comparator for Surgical Trials: Developing the MediDiet. (Under review).

  • Zhang IY, Flum DR, Agrawal N, Liao JM. Effects of Opioid Addiction Risk Information on Americans’ Agreement with Postoperative Opioid Minimization and Perceptions of Quality. (Under review).

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